Would you continue working once you had a million dollars in the bank?

What would you do if you had billions to spend?

Once you have a fleet of expensive cars, a big house (or three) and all the shoes you could ever wear, the novelty of having money to spare wears a bit thin, and you look around for better ways to spend your cash.

Would you be one of the billionaires who invest their money for the greater good of humanity? Tej Kohli is a billionaire you might like to imitate.

Who Is Tej Kohli?

Mr. Kohli has gone from humble beginnings to a multi-billionaire business person with global interests by focusing on his management ability and on the scientific advances that have made technological progress possible. Tej now lives in London with his wife, Wendy, and their two children.

Mr. Kohli has come a long way since he graduated from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) in Kanpur and his first job working in a tachometer factory. At age 23, Mr. Kohli persuaded his managers that his vision of a more advanced and profitable tachometer industry was worth pursuing. This experience set him on his life path of investing in disruptive digital technology opportunities that have positive social and environmental impacts.

Mr. Kohli is the antithesis of the media-stereotype early-stage business investor and has a strong work ethic. Kohli expects the people behind the companies he invests in to have a similar approach to work. One of Mr. Kohli’s driving forces is to help young entrepreneurs in developing countries like India to bring their dreams to fruition and to stop their world-changing products from withering on the vine.

Kohli’s Philanthropic Work

What is the difference between charity and philanthropy?

Charities accept donations from the public. Philanthropic ventures such as the Tej Kohli Foundation (Tejkohlifoundation.com) are funded entirely by one individual, in this case, Tej Kohli.

Mr. Kohli supports two charitable foundations, the Tej Kohli Foundation in India and the Funda Kohli (FundaKohli.com) in Costa Rica.

Much of Tej Kohli’s philanthropic work is related to the prevention and correction of severe visual impairment and blindness, especially in impoverished areas of the developing world. In India, the Tej Kohli Foundation works to provide corneal transplants to the 3.5 million Indians who suffer from corneal blindness.

The Foundation has an open-ended funding arrangement with the L V Prasad ophthalmic hospital in Hyderabad. It also funds the training of ophthalmic surgeon because India has only one tenth of the required number of specialist eye specialists. The Tej Kohli Foundation’s money pays for teams in buses to visit rural villages where they perform eye examinations and provide education to help prevent corneal diseases.

An important part of the Foundation’s work is to raise awareness of corneal blindness and the need for corneal donations. The supply of corneas will always fall short of the number of blind patients waiting for them, so the Foundation also funds research into synthetic corneas.

Artificial corneas are made from laboratory-grown collagen (the connective tissue found in ligaments and tendons). Six out of ten patients who receive an artificial cornea gain a similar sight improvement as they would with a donated cornea transplant. The synthetic collagen cornea encourages the regrowth of the patients’ own cells and the procedure is so successful that in 90% of patients their healthy corneal cells cover the artificial cornea within two years.

Kohli’s Investments

The money for Mr. Kohli’s charity work comes from his investments. Funding health services like treating and reducing corneal blindness is expensive, so Kohli’s business investments need to have high-performance expectations.

Mr. Kohli’s investments are more than financial. He also shares knowledge, contacts and expertise with any of the startups that are successful in attracting his cash. Kohli believes that sharing everything he has is the best way to ensure massive growth.

Many of Tej Kohli’s investments are made through his company, Kohli Ventures, which focuses on advising and investing in entrepreneurs who have world-changing ideas, but who would struggle to reach their maximum potential without help. Kohli Ventures is an international company in every sense of the world, with offices in Saudi Arabia, England, Canada, India and the USA and investments in startups around the world.

Zynergy, Dynacart and Elegant Technology Inc. are three examples of businesses that align well with Mr. Kohli’s investment principles are, and he has made substantial investments in all three.

Zyneregy

Zynergy (http://zynergygroup.net/) is an Indian solar energy company that was founded in 2011. The company provides a broad range of services within the solar industry, offering an all-in-one solution to companies, public bodies, and governments.

Services provided include town-scale solar lighting systems that include lighting for 80,000 homes, as well as solar equipment to individuals who want to go off-grid. Zynergy works with large utility companies, too, installing and maintaining multi-megawatt solar power electricity generating facilities.

Dynacart

Dynacart is an Irish-based online payment gateway that has ground-breakingly simple integrations with all web-based shopping carts. Charges are transparent, and there are no complex or hidden rules that sellers have to comply with.

Dynacart offers an extra service to companies that have only a few products to offer – an integrated and fully customizable shopping cart. Anything that makes an entrepreneur’s life easier, and there is even an all-in-one service that allows you to order a site complete with an installed shopping cart and payment gateway.

Elegant Technology Inc.

Elegant Technologies Incorporated is a Connecticut-based company that was founded in 2014 as a joint venture between Tej Kohli and Michael Staw. The company is developing state of the art software called ElegantWeb, which will combine a content management system (CMS) and a customer relations management (CRM) into one seamless application.

ElegantWeb, will give content managers an easy way to make changes to complex data-driven websites. It includes a customer support center where administrators can assign support tickets and follow up customer issues, reducing the likelihood of tickets being mishandled or closed too soon.

Are You Looking for an Investor?

With a net worth of $6 billion, Tej Kohli could be the investor you are looking for, but you will need to match some pretty stringent criteria before he considers working with you.

If you are looking for cash without any involvement by the donor, keep looking and good luck to you. Tej Kohli’s company, Kohli Ventures, only works with businesses that align with Mr. Kohli’s philosophy; he is not a bank, but an advisor and investor.

When Mr. Kohli invests money in a business, he also expends time, knowledge and resources. He expects a degree of influence as a result of his investments because Kohli Ventures is much more than just a source of money for cash-strapped businesses. The investees get a package, not just the banknotes.

Is your company’s product likely to be disruptive of the status quo? Is there a potential for exponential growth? Is it a digital product? Is your business democratic and a good employer? Do you prioritize environmental issues? If your answers are all positive, then contact Kohli Ventures and ask Mr. Kohli’s team if an investment is possible.

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